Sonic 3 & Knuckles is one of the first games I remember playing, ever. I remember asking of the older guys in my incredibly small, rural Portuguese village to "put a Sonic videogame in my computer" after seeing an ad for a Sonic videogame in a magazine back then. This must've been back in 2010, 2011 - I was 8 or 9 - and I don't remember what specific game the ad was for, but the dude downloaded Sonic Mega Collection Plus onto my small Packard Bell laptop, along with Puzzle Bobble and Metal Slug bundled with the MAME emulator, and I spent most of the time playing on my computer circling through the first levels of those videogames.

I don't really understand people who say they beat games as kids; maybe it makes more sense if you had a console and your parents bought one specific game that you asked for (as it was the case with my 2DS and Pokémon X - I beat it!), but my parents barely ever gave me money for anything, let alone videogames, except for, I think, one or two instances. So, for me, it was mainly flash games, hacked Pokémon ROMs in VisualBoyAdvance, and pirated games that may or may not have not contaminated my poor and already slow little computer with adware and malware more than once.

But I digress. My memories of Sonic are mainly from the original classic trilogy, whose first levels I beat over and over again. I don't quite remember why, but with Sonic 3 and Knuckles, I have more memories from Mushroom Hill Zone than Angel Island Zone - I don't know if I triggered something to play Sonic and Knuckles instead of Sonic 3, but it must've been something like it. I liked bouncing around on the mushrooms, I thought the things that trapped you unless you spindashed your way out of their grip were annoying, and I was surprised to see Knuckles being evil.

That more or less sums up my experience with the game until I tried Sonic 3 A.I.R. I played a borrowed copy of Sonic Rivals 2 on my PSP, whose UMD broke and only the disk inside remains now, in one of my old closets. It was cool. In my early teen years, my gaming life was basically just Pokémon; later on, I explored more games and acquired tastes for different, less mainstream franchises, and I just mostly didn't think about Sonic. When I tried playing a Sonic game, I just didn't get the appeal. Sonic went fast, but I couldn't just press forward because I would bump into obstacles (like in the first few levels)? What the fuck? Where's the fun in this? I wanted to speed though everything without a second thought. The levels were confusing, there were just way too many obstacles going on. I just thought it was boring and, with the abundance of videogames to play, I didn't find any reason to press on. I remember Sonic Mania coming out, me installing it, and not feeling any particular feelings towards the game.

I mostly installed this out of curiosity, since it has such phenomenal reviews on Backloggd. I like fan made ports, localizations, videogame labors of love in general, even if I don't personally harbor an interest in the franchises or the like. I like messing around with this stuff. I recently patched a ROM of Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere with the localization overhaul by Load Word Team, Just In Case I Ever Want To Play It™. Hence, I booted A.I.R., "just to see how it ran", I thought.

It ran beautifully. The game is incredible.

I was incredibly, pleasantly surprised to have a Sonic game finally "click" for me. First off, the port is obviously gorgeous and shows off an outstanding level of polish - Eukaryot clearly deeply loves the game, and they have my kudos. I'm glad that I ended having my "definitive" experience with such a spotless version of Sonic 3. Secondly, this is a fantastic videogame, full stop. Sonic 3 & Knuckles truly feels like a complete package, if that makes sense. In my experience with it, I don't think I felt like anything was missing or left the game craving any more levels or bosses or whatever - it's very densely packed with quality gameplay, setpieces, tunes (some composed by Michael Jackson, I hear?) boss fights, and all very nicely wrapped up in a little bow. As I paced through the first levels, I thought to myself: "wow, how did I NOT see the appeal of this before?"

Generally speaking, in videogames, you either choose to speed through a gameplay segment, or take your time exploring it to catch anything you might otherwise miss. But, in Sonic, exploration rewards you not just with knowledge about the level but, with it, the ability to more gracefully speed through it afterwards. The levels are sprawling in verticality, almost labyrinthic, and full of nooks and crannies with special stages and powerups. This might be a superficial analysis of "the point" of classic Sonic's gameplay loop, but realizing this by myself was key to be able to interpret the level layouts and the game itself as a little puzzle to be slowly deciphered and put together while bouncing around, instead of a mindless sidescrolling pseudo-racing track.

I like the variety of Sonic sprites in the game, be it with him ducking, sprinting, rotating horizontally, vertically. That combined with the very good physics and some smart visual tricks makes for some real kinetic and dynamic gameplay. The opening of the Ice Cap Zone, for example, is hard as hell. Game's colorful and spritework is very good, and the sometimes almost abstract aesthetics of some levels like Marble Gallery or Carnival Night are a real treat to the eyes. I very much enjoyed the differences and gimmicks each level has to offer. I feel like Sonic Team really made the most out of what they could with the Mega Drive hardware. Level design is super solid, too - I don't understand too much about Sonic level design or level design in general, but I was never bored. I giggled a bit when I realized falling in Ice Cap looped into itself and I was waiting with my controller in my hand for nothing. My friend told me about the infamous Carnival Night barrel (I would've not figured it out otherwise). The Mushroom Hill bouncy mushrooms, levers and wind are awesome, the drifting sand and ropes in Sandopolis are awesome, Hidden Palace is gorgeous, etc. The game consistently stays pretty, varied, fresh, interesting, and the I thought the Blue Sphere Special Stages were super nice, as well.

The only level that I didn't enjoy as much, and whose difficult I felt was unbalanced compared to the rest, was Death Egg. Obviously, I know that the last level in a videogame is supposed to be a culmination of the difficulty in it, but I genuinely felt like it was a huge spike compared to the rest - probably about one third of my play time is just me hitting my head against Death Egg over and over again. It got to a point where I was one click away from deleting the game and marking it as dropped, which frustrated me immensely; this was being a great experience, this made Sonic click for me, so far the game was being so nicely executed in just about every aspect I could think of, why the hell was I getting stuck Now, so close to the end? Plus, I just hate dropping games just as I'm about to finish them. Uugh. Anyway, this level has some seriously frustrating elements. The enemies are the toughest and guys like Spikebonker (lol) can seriously kill you a few times if you don't pay attention to where you're going. It also has several sections where your movement is controlled by some sort of platform, like the light rights or the mechanical caterpillars, which makes progressing slower. And the bosses are a test to your endurance and to your patience. In the last one, where Eggman shoots you with a laser, if you die, you respawn with 0 rings, and get instakilled at the slightest mistake. It's frustrating.

And just as I was about to drop the videogame, one of my friends urges me to try one last time. I open the game and, with only a single death, I complete the level. I... beat it? I don't see many more people complaining about Death Egg. Maybe I was just mentally stuck...? Weird.

Anyway, I complete the game. As a treat, I try Doomsday Zone, which has just the right amount of space bravado for the actually-this-is-the-last-level level. I think my Sonic curiosity has been satisfied for a while, but I'm definitely checking out titles like Sonic CD and Sonic Mania Plus in the future. Please play this videogame, even if you've never understood the appeal of Sonic before, or have played other Sonic videogames but didn't enjoy them so much. I believe you're definitely going to enjoy it!!